C.K. Prahalad

was the Paul and Ruth McCracken Distinguished University Professor of

Corporate Strategy at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business in

the University of Michigan.

 During his life, he was frequently ranked as one of the most prominent business thinkers in the world.

He was renowned as the co-author of "Core Competence of the Corporation"[4] (with Gary Hamel) and

"The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid"[5] (with Stuart L. Hart).

born in 1941 in to a Kannada speaking family in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu. His father was a well-known Tamil scholar and judge in Chennai

At 19, he joined Union Carbide, he was recruited by the manager of the local Union Carbide battery plant after completing his B.Sc degree in Physics from Loyola College, Chennai, part of the University of Madras.

He worked there for four years. Prahalad called his Union Carbide experience a major inflection point in his life. Four years later, he did his post graduate work in management at theIndian Institute of Management Ahmedabad.

At Harvard Business School, Prahalad wrote a doctoral thesis on multinational management in just two and a half years, graduating with a D.B.A. degree in 1975

Professorship and teaching

After graduating from Harvard, Prahalad returned to his master's degree alma mater, the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad.

But he soon returned to the United States, when in 1977, he was hired by the University of Michigan's School of Business Administration, where he advanced to the top tenured appointment as a full professor.

 In 2005, Dr. Prahalad earned the university's highest distinction, Distinguished University Professor.

 Core competency

A core competency is a concept in management theory introduced by, C. K. Prahalad, Julian Kriviak and Gary Hamel.

 It can be defined as "a harmonized combination of multiple resources and skills that distinguish a firm in the marketplace".

Core competencies fulfill three criteria

1. Provides potential access to a wide variety of markets.

2. Should make a significant contribution to the perceived customer benefits of the end product.

3. Difficult to imitate by competitors.

 "The Core Competence of the Corporation"

Core competencies are developed through the process of continuous improvements over the period of time rather than a single large change.

To succeed in an emerging global market, it is more important and required to build core competencies rather than vertical integration. 

In Competing for the Future, the authors Prahalad and Hamel show how executives can develop the industry foresight necessary to adapt to industry changes and discover ways of controlling resources that will enable the company to attain goals despite any constraints.

Executives should develop a point of view on which core competencies can be built for the future to revitalize the process of new business creation.

Developing an independent point of view of tomorrow's opportunities and building capabilities that exploit them is the key to future industry leadership

For an organization to be competitive, it needs not only tangible resources but intangible resources like core competences that are difficult and challenging to achieve. It is critical to manage and enhance the competences in response to industry changes in the future.

For example, Microsoft has expertise in many IT based innovations where, for a variety of reasons, it is difficult for competitors to replicate or compete with Microsoft's core competences.

In a race to achieve cost cutting, quality and productivity, most executives do not spend their time developing a corporate view of the future because this exercise demands high intellectual energy and commitment. The difficult questions may challenge their own ability to view the future opportunities but an attempt to find their answers will lead towards organizational benefits.

Bottom of the Pyramid

The more current usage refers to the billions of people living on less than $2 per day, as first defined in 1998 by Professors C.K. Prahalad and Stuart L. Hart. It was subsequently expanded upon by both in their books: The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid by Prahalad in 2004[2] and Capitalism at the Crossroads by Hart in 2005.[3]

Prahalad proposes that businesses, governments, and donor agencies stop thinking of the poor as victims and instead start seeing them as resilient and creative entrepreneurs as well as value-demanding consumers.[4] He proposes that there are tremendous benefits to multi-national companies who choose to serve these markets in ways responsive to their needs. After all the poor of today are the middle-class of tomorrow. There are also poverty reducing benefits if multi-nationals work with civil society organizations and local governments to create new local business models.

Microcredit[edit] One example of "bottom of the pyramid" is the growing 

microcredit market in South Asia, particularly in Bangladesh. With technology being steadily cheaper and more ubiquitous, it is becoming economically efficient to "lend tiny amounts of money to people with even tinier assets". An Indian banking report argues that the microfinance network (called "Sa-Dhan" in India) "helps the poor" and "allows banks to 'increase their business'".[7]

Market-specific products[edit] One of many examples of products that are designed with

needs of the very poor in mind is that of a shampoo that works best with cold water and is sold in small packets to reduce barriers of upfront costs for the poor. Such a product is marketed by Hindustan Unilever.

Co-creation

Co-creation is a form of Economic strategy that emphasizes the generation and ongoing realization of mutual Company-Customer value. It views markets as platforms for firms and active customers to share, combine and renew each other's resources and capabilities to create value through new forms of interaction, service and learning mechanisms. It differs from the traditional passive consumer market of the past.

Honors and awards

In 1994, he was presented the Maurice Holland Award from the Industrial Research Institute for an article published in Research-Technology Management titled "The Role of Core Competencies in the Corporation.“

In 2009, he was awarded Pravasi Bharatiya Sammaan

In 2009, he was conferred Padma Bhushan 'third in the hierarchy of civilian awards' by the Government of India.

In 2009, he was named the world's most influential business thinker on the Thinkers50.com list, published by The Times.

In 2009, he was awarded the Herbert Simon Award by the Rajk László College for Advanced Studies (Corvinus University of Budapest).

In 2010, he was posthumously awarded the Viipuri International Prize in Strategic (Technology) Management and Business Economics by Lappeenranta University of Technology

In 2011, the Southern Regional Headquarters of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) was named as Prof C K Prahalad Center